Differing views of ‘Paradise’
RE “Now Playing in Israel,” by Ken Ellingwood, March 1: “Paradise Now” was an expression of the director’s vision, based on the reality of the human condition of a certain group of people living under harsh conditions imposed by an outside military rule. Why is it so important to certain Israelis that no one see Palestinians as human? It’s naked racism to deny the humanity of a people, but this isn’t simple racism; it’s deliberate, organized racism if “powerful Israelis” and the newspaper mentioned in Ellingwood’s piece are backing it.
LYN MCKUEN
Los Angeles
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KAIS NASHEF, an Arab with Israeli citizenship, has the privilege and freedom to express his artistic and journalistic talent in a democratic nation. But one must object to his insensitive dialogue that “blowing up a bus in a suicide is a human deed [by] someone with legs and hands, somebody who played football when they were young, somebody who has a mother.” It is an arrogant and inexcusable statement that no civilized society can accept.
The SS murderers at Auschwitz and other humans who engaged in murder and genocide also had legs, hands and mothers. The SS in Auschwitz used their legs and hands to torture and murder millions.
No reasonable rhetoric can excuse these inhuman assaults by “human” terrorists who indiscriminately slaughter civilians who have mothers, fathers and siblings. Israelis, relatives and friends of victims around the globe have every right to call these assassins demons.
VERNON L. RUSHEEN
Woodland Hills